The Ann Arbor Camera Club, probably like so many other camera clubs, is a genre of its own. Year after year water cascasdes over rocks, the flowers bloom and the sun sets over lakes lighting up the sky in vivid colors. Paint peels from doors, the red barns pose silently, and the golden bails of hay lie upon the fields. The photography of Walker Evans, Robert Frank, Garry Winogrand, Lee Friedlander, William Eggleston is a world apart. For how can their cold, cynicism and realism compare to the pretty, treacly world of hypersaturated colors, grand vistas and tender moments borrowed from pretty paintings - you know, the classy motel type of paintings.

The Larry Fink exhibit last week in Toronto was small, about twenty photographs total, but memorable. Although, I am familiar with the images from the Social Graces book which I bought a few months back I have long learned that no book no matter how well printed comes even close to the experience of seeing the real print. So much of the meaning of his photographs is in the aggregate of the small nuances of posture, poise and expression projected by his candidly photographed subjects. No photographer has ever made the privelaged socialites of New York look so miserable, insecure and vain. Much of the effect is also achieved by use of portable strobe which spotlights the subjects in glaring light while leaving them floating in a black abyss.

Popped into Dawn Treader books on Sunday to check out photography books. Found this title by Graham Rawle and started reading it, could not put it down so wound up buying it and finished it the same day. Its not really about photography directly - its a mystery novel. But in a rather cynical and backhanded way it really describes the amateur photography scene. The PBase crowd my be offended to read it, but on the other hand given the oblique nature of the jokes they might never get it. Its an interesting book not just for the story but for the creative way its put together to look like a real diary complete with pasted in scraps from magazines, hand notes and all.